More shrinkage for Buckeye Lake island

Published: June 5, 2003 8:00PM

BUCKEYE LAKE (AP) Ohios only floating island is slowly disappearing.

A 30-by-45-foot chunk of Cranberry Bog broke away overnight Tuesday. With full-grown maples acting as sails, it landed two miles away in front of some docks on the north shore of Buckeye Lake, said Jane Beathard, spokeswoman for the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.

Imagine waking up and all of a sudden you have an island in front of your house, said Edward Frank III, manager of Buckeye Lake State Park, about 30 miles southeast of Columbus.

Its not like we can glue it back in its spot, he said.

Thursday morning, the chunk was towed about a mile southwest to Fairfield Beach, where its tethered offshore by a 500-pound anchor until workers can remove vegetation and consult with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on how to remove the chunk from the lake, Beathard said. It was a navigation hazard while floating free.

The 11-acre island is what remains of 50 acres of sphagnum peat moss that floated to the surface when the former bog was flooded to make the manmade lake in 1830 to provide water for the Ohio and Erie Canal.

The floating bog thrived, supporting flowers, grasses, bushes and trees on its spongy surface. It became a National Natural Landmark in 1968.

It measured 20 acres in 1973 when it became a state nature preserve, but the island erodes continually because the alkaline lake reacts chemically with the acidic moss. A 65-by-165-foot chunk broke free in 1993.

Wind and waves including waves created by boating contribute to the breakup, Beathard said. We do our best to protect it.

About 400 visitors chosen by lottery are allowed to tour a boardwalk over the bog once a year, usually as orchids bloom in late spring. None of the islands rare plants were on the broken chunk. This years visit is still on, Beathard said.

The island will likely disintegrate over the next 30 years, said Greg Seymour, DNR district preserve manager.

The sad thing is there is nothing we can do to keep it from going away, he said.